Ciara Moloney Podcast

Friday Film Showcased, Episode 3: Jack Nicholson – The Fortune (1975) | Five Easy Pieces (1970), About Schmidt (2002) & more

For many years, with regard to their film-watching, Ciara and Conor have been theming their months. On Friday Film Showcased (FFS to friends), they look back on themes gone by.

In the tertian episode of FFS, Ciara and Conor discuss the life and films of Jack Nicholson, and Showcase one film in particular.

Spoiler: It’s The Fortune (1975). But they also talk a lot about Five Easy Pieces, The Last Detail, About Schmidt, The Shooting (and the Roger Corman days), Head (and the Monkees), Something’s Gotta Give, Tommy and Broadcast News. How do you know? Because you listened to the podcast.

Jack (Nicholson) July: https://letterboxd.com/hoganassasin/list/jack-nicholson-july/

You can listen to it here:

Episode 3: Jack Nicholson – The Fortune (1975) | Five Easy Pieces (1970), About Schmidt (2002) & more – Friday Film Showcased

And you can even listen accompanied by the soothing sounds of desert winds. Relaxing!

Desert Wind Edition – Episode 3: Jack Nicholson – The Fortune (1975) | Five Easy Pieces (1970), About Schmidt (2002) & more – Friday Film Showcased

Listen and subscribe on: Spotify (with desert wind) || Apple Podcasts (with desert wind) || Amazon Music (with desert wind) || Castbox (with desert wind) || Overcast (with desert wind)|| Pocketcasts (with desert wind) || Goodpods (with desert wind)

Mentioned in the podcast

Darren Aronofsky doesn’t know who Mario Bava is: https://youtu.be/B6LeXVCiOOM?si=emomg909-7HfoK16

Matt Damon on Jack Nicholson changing the script in The Departed: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/teK_CFdc7gM

Klingons do not: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bxIs-Z15jk

Jack Nicholson interview with the BFI: https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/jack-nicholson-interview-1974-antonioni-passenger-easy-rider

Jack Nicholson: The Ultimate Viewing Guide in Empire magazine: https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/empire-classic-jack-nicholson/

Monte Hellman interview in 2011 at The Flashback Files: https://www.flashbackfiles.com/monte-hellman-interview

Vincent Canby’s review of The Fortune in The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/1975/05/21/archives/nicholss-fortune-is-oldtime-farce.html

Ben Mankiewicz introducing The Fortune on TCM:1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM3vtaKemG4

Ciara’s film diary on Head for In The Mood magazine: https://www.inthemoodmagazine.com/issue-2/film-diaries

1. Ben’s comments are partly incorporated in Conor’s trailer for The Fortune, included in the episode. There is no trailer for this movie on the entire internet. Mad. Anyway, thanks, Ben!

Ciara Moloney Podcast

Friday Film Showcased, Episode 2: Watership Down (1978) | The Diamond Arm (1969)

For many years, with regard to their film-watching, Ciara and Conor have been theming their months. For instance:

  • Cartoon June – you know, animated.
  • Soviet (J)Un(e)(ion) – Films from countries that were once in the USSR.
  • Jack July – Nicholson that is!
  • Giallo July.

Sometimes the titles of these months are puns, sometimes alliterative. Sometimes, it is awful strained altogether (see above). But it has always been fun. Or at least I hope so. They’ve been doing it long enough!

In the bi-augural (that means second?) episode of FFS, Ciara and Conor discuss their June film seasons (Cartoon June and Soviet (J)Un(e)ion), and Showcase two in particular.

Spoiler: It’s the two films in the title of this episode. Watchlist:

Cartoon June: https://letterboxd.com/hoganassasin/list/cartoon-june/

Soviet (J)un(e)ion: https://letterboxd.com/hoganassasin/list/soviet-junion/

You can listen to it here:

Episode 2: Watership Down (1978) | The Diamond Arm (1969) – Friday Film Showcased

And you can even listen to it accompanied by the soothing sounds of a rainstorm. Relaxing!

Relaxing Rain Edition – Episode 2: Watership Down (1978) | The Diamond Arm (1969) – Friday Film Showcased

Listen and subscribe on: Spotify (with relaxing rain sounds) || Apple Podcasts (with relaxing rain sounds) || Amazon Music (with relaxing rain sounds) || Castbox (with relaxing rain sounds) || Pocketcasts (with relaxing rain sounds) || Goodpods (with relaxing rain sounds)

Mentioned in the podcast

Ciara’s Article on Soviet Cinema: https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/2023/10/why-you-should-be-watching-soviet-cinema

Slash Film article on The Last Unicorn and Studio Ghibli: https://www.slashfilm.com/751443/turns-out-the-last-unicorn-is-a-secret-studio-ghibli-film/

Philip French’s review of An American Tail: https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-observer-an-american-tail/124883207/

The Watership Down Podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/watershipdown

Guillermo Del Toro on Watership Down: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sN-crgRXV0

Cinemablend article on Song of the South and Splash Mountain: https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2547968/the-complicated-history-of-disneylands-splash-mountain-and-song-of-the-south

Ciara Moloney External Links

Scarface Is For Girls

Last summer, at the peak of the Barbenheimer phenomenon, it seemed like cinematic gender essentialism – the kind that made a Ghostbusters reboot a lightning rod for controversy the guts of a decade ago – had finally died off. Barbie and Oppenheimer were released on the same day, and what was set up as a versus between the “boy movie” and the “girl movie” quickly became a both/and. There were no movies for this gender or that, just a couple of great films that we all wanted to see. I saw them back-to-back. Loads of people saw them back-to-back, and tons more watched both films at some point in their long runs on the big screen. The movies were back, and this time, quadrants could be damned. 

Then awards season came along and, as usual, crushed all my hopes and dreams. 

I wrote about the girliest movie for girls going, Brian De Palma’s Scarface, for Crooked Marquee! You can read it here.

Ciara Moloney External Links

25 Years Later, Sports Night Is Still Aaron Sorkin’s Greatest Work

Nearly everyone agrees: Aaron Sorkin’s career lives in the shadow of his early masterpiece. He has tried to recapture the magic of this small-screen triumph over and over again, mostly in vain. “What if I did the same show but set at Saturday Night Live?” he asked, and gave us Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. “What if I did the same show but set in a newsroom?” he asked, and gave us The Newsroom. It’s a truism of Sorkin studies, generally mentioned within the first two paragraphs of a review of any movie he had a hand in. And everybody’s right—except for one thing: they think it’s The West Wing he’s trying to recreate. 

I wrote about Sports Night for Paste. You can read it here!

Ciara Moloney Podcast

Friday Film Showcased, Episode 1: The Heartbreak Kid (1972) | Love’s Labour’s Lost (2000)

A brand new podcast, hot and fresh out the kitchen, hosted by Ciara Moloney and Conor Hogan.

For many years, with regard to their film-watching, Ciara and Conor have been theming their months. For instance:

  • Elaine May May (sic) – films starring, written by, or directed by Elaine May.
  • Darling works (?) of May – William Shakespeare Films.
  • Cartoon June – you know, animated.
  • Soviet (J)Un(e)(ion) – Films from countries that were once in the USSR.

Sometimes the titles of these months are puns, sometimes alliterative. Sometimes, it is awful strained altogether (see above). But it has always been fun. Or at least I hope so. They’ve been doing it long enough!

In the inaugural (that means first) episode of FFS, Ciara and Conor discuss their May film seasons (Elaine May and William Shakespeare), and Showcase two in particular.

Spoiler: It’s the two films in the title of this episode. Watchlist:

Elaine May: https://letterboxd.com/hoganassasin/list/elaine-may-may-sic/

William Shakespeare: https://letterboxd.com/hoganassasin/list/darling-works-of-may-shakespeare-watched/

You can listen to it here:

Episode 1: The Heartbreak Kid (1972) | Love's Labour's Lost (2000) – Friday Film Showcased

And you can even listen to it accompanied by the soothing sounds of a Crackling Fireplace. Relaxing!

Crackling Fireplace Edition – Episode 1: The Heartbreak Kid (1972) | Love's Labour's Lost (2000) – Friday Film Showcased

Listen and subscribe on: Spotify (with fireplace) || Apple Podcasts (with fireplace) || Amazon Music (with fireplace) || Castbox (with fireplace) || Pocketcasts (with fireplace)

Mentioned in the podcast

Jeffrey Salkin article on The Heartbreak Kid: https://religionnews.com/2021/05/20/charles-grodin/

Michael Sragow on Tootsie: https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3404-tootsie-one-great-dame

Kenneth Branagh and Love’s Labour’s Lost cast on Charlie Rose: https://charlierose.com/videos/19196

Ciara’s article in Ishtar: https://thesundae.net/2019/10/28/you-should-watch-ishtar/

Scenes from a Mall (1991): https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102849/

Ciara Moloney and Dean Buckley Podcast

Summer of Sam: The Sundae Presents Episode 37

Ciara and Dean co-host The Sundae Presents, a podcast in which they each make the other watch films they haven’t seen. Dean closes out this season’s regular episodes by showing Ciara his favourite Spike Lee film, Summer of Sam. They talk about punk vs disco, the madonna-whore complex and its relationship with Do the Right Thing.

Summer of Sam – The Sundae Presents

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Ciara Moloney Film

You Should (Not) Watch Julien Donkey-Boy

“I don’t know how much movies should entertain. To me, I’m always interested in movies that scar.”

David Fincher, interviewed by Mark Salisbury in Empire, February 1996

The first Harmony Korine film I saw was Spring Breakers, because Dean made me watch it for our podcast, The Sundae Presents. I did not like Spring Breakers, but in a way where saying whether I liked it or not seems like such a gross simplification that it becomes a lie. While watching it, I found what was great and awful about it impossible to parse, and from a distance, I mostly think of it as an epic troll – a movie whose existence is a joke despite it containing zero jokes. I remember the boring parts more than the unpleasantness that felt so visceral at the time.

Julien Donkey-Boy has not come out in the wash that way. I can feel its viscerality still wriggling in my blood. Korine’s sophomore directional outing, Julien Donkey-Boy is the sixth Dogme 95 film – it’s got the certificate and everything – though less because it strictly follows the Dogme 95 rules (no “superficial action,” no non-diegetic sound, only natural lighting, only handheld cameras) and more because what the hell else could it be? It is, at once, a family drama and totally outside the bounds of mainstream filmmaking. And since there are Dogme 95 movies that are both these things, fuck it, this one is too.

Continue reading “You Should (Not) Watch Julien Donkey-Boy” →
Ciara Moloney and Dean Buckley Podcast

Winter Brothers: The Sundae Presents Episode 36

Ciara and Dean co-host The Sundae Presents, a podcast in which they each make the other watch films they haven’t seen. This episode, Ciara makes Dean finally watch Winter Brothers, the debut film of their favourite Icelandic director, Hlynur Pálmason. They talk about its desolate landscapes, haunting ambiguities and floppy dicks.

Winter Brothers – The Sundae Presents

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Ciara Moloney and Dean Buckley Podcast

Excalibur: The Sundae Presents Episode 35

Ciara and Dean co-host The Sundae Presents, a podcast in which they each make the other watch films they haven’t seen. This episode, Dean makes Ciara watch a fourth film shot in his hometown, an Arthurian epic by Exorcist II director John Boorman: Excalibur, which features zero locust POV and tons of before-they-were-famous casting. They talk about Cahir Castle, Gabriel Byrne’s soap opera career, and what are movies even supposed to be like, anyway?

Friday Film Showcased – The Big Clock (1948): The Big Clock/No Way Out Special Part 1 – The Sundae Presents

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